Hasbro Q&A Final ROund of 2009
 

Hi folks and happy holidays!

We hope you and yours are having a terrific holiday season and looking forward to 2010 as much as we are.

Just a reminder that the final round of the 2009 GI JOE Q&A session will take place RIGHT AFTER THE NEW YEAR.

We need all questions submitted NO LATER than 12:00PM (noon) eastern on Monday January 4th - exactly one week from today. That means that you can send them in earlier; and I actually encourage that, so no issues arise.

If we don't receive them by then, they will have to wait until we start up the new 2010 schedule in March (details forthcoming).

***Please note: There will be no exceptions this round for late submissions. Because January is Toy Fair prep, there is zero wiggle room. So get the questions in as early as possible - maybe before the weekend - then you can relax and toast the new year stress-free.

Thanks so much and happy new year!

Mike and team






Please get these in by 12.31.09 so I can send them off Saturday or so. All the questions are excellent so far and it will be VERY hard to figure out what to ask. Good job everyone. These are incredibly thoughtful.

1) The cardboard dioramas that come in multipacks rock! Is there any way to have the designs and building instructions available on Hasbro's website, for those who missed out on the sets or could not afford them?

2) Considering the success of Lego Star Wars, Lego Indiana Jones, Mega Bloks Spider-Man and Mega Bloks HALO, has Hasbro given any consideration to reviving the Built To Rule toyline, using smaller figurines instead of regular Joe figures with brick connectors on their limbs?

3) With Pursuit of Cobra, two of the four environments feature a notable specialist of said environment, Snow Job for Arctic Threat and Recondo for Jungle Assault. Will the Desert Battle and City Strike environments feature such specialists, like Dusty and Shock(wave)blast?

4) During the last Q&A, you said Pursuit Of Cobra would show up in "the back half of 2010". Does this mean we'll be without new G.I.Joe figures until June 2010?

5) What kind of guidelines must be followed for certain items (ie: The Geonosis Arena being used for the Conquest on Cobra Mountain) to be used in another brand?

6) Why was the Mantis Attack Craft's stock photography edited with two sets of controls to look like a two-seater, when the toy itself only has one set of controls and can only fit one figure?

7) At one point Hasbro planned to make a different Scrap-Iron using parts that made him ressemble the original a lot more (Shipwreck torso, Airborne arms and legs), with very positive response from fans. Why was this tooling not chosen over the Comic Pack version for either of his Rise of Cobra redecos?

One of my favorite things about getting a new vehicle is the sticker sheet, especially for Cobra. Can you give some insight as to how the stickers are chosen, designed, and who decides where they should go? Some Cobra designs have what appears to be Cyrillic letters. Are they meaningful or random? Is there any chance you could include
extra Cobra emblems on future sticker sheets?

I'll add to the question about the decals...
Over on JoeCustoms there has been a debate about what the 788 signifies on the original HISS. Is it the vehicles ID number? Is it the unit designation to which the vehicle is assigned?

What other vehicles are slated for the old/new (or what ever that series was called that has the Polar Battle Bear and the Rock Slider)?

Are the future figures going to remain looking like their movie counterparts or will they continue looking like the Resolute figures, changing only for the next Joe movie?

MORE MARINES!

Now that the Joes have "The PIT," is there any plans for a large Cobra base?

Considering that you still have the original molds for fan favorites like the Snowserpent, Viper and Trooper, why have more not been done with figures like these and others? GI Joe toys are sold at various dollar stores, is there something that makes releasing these toys there difficult?

Funskool seems to be producing GI Joe toys once more, or so we think. Can this be confirmed by Hasbro and if so what molds do they have?

1. Will o-ring figures come back as the main line?
2. Just kidding :p

Great question. I would by GI Joe vehicles and Lego minifig style BTR. But...It will never happen!

Are there any plans to release the 25A Stinger in 2010? This vehicle is an instant classic, and all I have ever seen are pictures. I think this is a guaranteed successful vehicle.

Hasbro emailed me this morning and requested I send the 3 questions as soon as possible. So consider the need for questions to hasbro closed since I sent them in today. Thanks for all the questions, it was really hard to choose what to use this time. We'll get the answers in a couple weeks.

What questions did you pick?

Hey Joe head honchos! Got 3 questions for you and then some!

1. One of my favorite things about getting a new vehicle is the sticker sheet, especially for Cobra. Can you give some insight as to how the stickers are chosen, designed, and who decides where they should go? Some Cobra designs have what appears to be Cyrillic letters. Are they meaningful or random? Is there any chance you could include extra Cobra emblems on future sticker sheets? Over on JoeCustoms there has been a debate about what the 788 signifies on the original HISS. Is it the vehicles ID number? Is it the unit designation to which the vehicle is assigned? (I figured these fall under the same idea)

Hey Graham,
Here you go...
Thanks, we are glad you like the sticker sheets. The stickers are chosen
based on their relevance for the product and the storyline. We can
certainly look into adding more Cobra emblems on future packs. The
Cyrillic lettering was actually first introduced by some of the original
G.I. Joe designers as a type of 'villain' language. We try to include some
now to pay tribute to this. In most cases the numbers on vehicles
represent their ID number so they can be spotted in battle.


2. Considering the success of Lego Star Wars, Lego Indiana Jones, Mega Bloks Spider-Man and Mega Bloks HALO, has Hasbro given any consideration to reviving the Built To Rule toyline, using smaller figurines instead of regular Joe figures with brick connectors on their limbs?

We have no plans for this at the moment.

3. The cardboard dioramas that come in multipacks rock! Is there any way to have the designs and building instructions available on Hasbro's website, for those who missed out on the sets or could not afford them?

We're glad you like the dioramas. We are trying to introduce more to the
range going forward. We'll look into getting the designs and instructions
online. This is a great suggestion. Sorry we cannot help with your other
requests :-)



Just for the record, I tend to ask a few other personal requests/questions so that's what the latter means. What those are, you guys don't need to know other than I'm trying to make them laugh in the office. ;)

Awesome!

There you go again, go on about all your secrets.

Groovy.

I didn't think G.I.*JOE would hook up with Lego, though that'd be cooler than cool, but Lego is in with Star Wars, Batman, Marvel, Indiana Jones and Harry Potter. And now they hooked up with *BARF* Disney. I'd have figured by now Disney would have had their own interlocking brick style toy.

It would be cool to even see the cardboad diorama inserts sold seperately. That is one thing that has truely lacked in the Joeverse; settings. Sure you've got the Flagg, MCC, Pit, Terror Drome and a couple of HQs, but even those are kinda limited.

Excellent questions about the decals, especially the one about the significance of the 788 markings on the HISS. Way to think outside the box. You should be showered with beer and buxom women.

I thought the questions selected were pretty good. The answers from Hasbro seem more direct and to the point than in previous Q&A's. Nice.

Agreed. Joe Customs sent in their questions and they got short stament answers, but these are good.

I think it may be JC moderator's way of asking too. For some reason he thought he'd be creative and put the questions in the form of a hiaku. Clever, but I don't think the Hasbro guy was overly amused.

That's cool, I always look forward to these. I for one, will miss them.

I'm looking forward to those pack-in displays appearing in online form.

I think WE are simply asking better and more pointed questions and not coming off as angry fans. That way, Hasbro is more interested in answering. Plus, I think we are asking intelligent questions that are making them think a little bit.





If only you guys knew what the side questions were. I believe Lord Raven, Frk525 and Rambo all know. Usually has to do with getting a date with Natalie Portman and/or Lady Gaga since Hasbro is close to NYC and the hasbro guys are like, rock stars and and and... ;)

I didn't know you were into that kind of stuff.

BURN! ...wait... what?

Lady Gaga says she was born with both male and female genitalia.

I dunno... I'm still not sure about that. I have my theories.

But after watching BAD ROMANCE the video a million times... maybe it don't matter? "Don't matter if they're Acturian/Octurian, baby!"

Ahhh, I see.... Burn!

I can tell you a secret about Joecustoms.com, a long time ago they were home to the "biggest" G.I. Joe message board, they still seem to think that even though they've been increasingly irrelevant since 2006

Also it seems that Sonnelion should change his name to "Sonned-elion" because that's what happened! and by Jay no less :p

Joecustoms...I had (still have?) an account there before I found Joedios and Flickr, both of which rendered Joecustoms redundant. I haven't accessed my account there for probably five years or more. :rolleyes:

I only subscribe to two forums; Joe Customs and Joe Dios. I like Customs simply because there is a lot of good information about customizing and looking at some of the other guy's stuff is inspiring, but now I'm more into taking pictures of my Joes and less about customizing them.

That's true, JC is a source of ideas, but the standard of photography on that site sometimes leaves a little to be desired. All the effort of creating a custom figure at least deserves a decent clear picture of it.

I like to go over to the Joecustoms site and look at the customs and the posters there looks like a great bunch of fans. We should enqurage them to post here, let the make some real pictures.

AMEN!